Social media sentiment continues to turn against Binance for its alleged role in crypto liquidations on October 10.
Immediately after October 10, traders were already threatening legal action. However, this year, new lawsuits and arbitrations look to be underway, along with numerous other complaints and legal setbacks.
A simple chart of crypto asset prices illustrates the reason for the dogpile of complaints against Binance.
Following months of clear correlation with broad indices like the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100, crypto decoupled precisely on October 10 — and has trended downward ever since.
Total crypto market capitalization vs. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100. Source: TradingView
Read more: Binance’s $1B $BTC buy fails to win back trust after Oct. 10
October 10 auto-deleveraging
As the world’s largest crypto exchange, Binance had a unique role to play in October 10.
For example, flash-crash prices as low as 99.9% existed only on the exchange on that date, and it had just changed its pricing feeds and treatment of a major stablecoin, Ethena USDE.
Wintermute CEO Evgeny Gaevoy called Binance’s auto-deleveraging prices “very strange,” while Ark Invest’s Cathie Wood blamed billions in crypto liquidations on a Binance “software glitch.”
A post with millions of impressions also called out errors in Binance’s pricing oracles for cross-margin unified accounts.
Ethena USDE played a particularly important role in Binance’s October 10 liquidations. After crashing to less than $0.67 on Binance, USDE has regained its $1 peg but has shed more than half its market capitalization since 10/10.
Binance attempts to restore confidence
Without admitting to responsibility, Binance nonetheless quickly — and voluntarily — agreed to pay huge sums of money to customers that suffered losses on that date.
Shortly after the event, Binance announced $328 million in compensation plus another $400 million worth of loans and vouchers.
In another attempt restore confidence amid the bearish knock-on effects of October 10, Binance announced in late January 2026 that it would use its entire $1 billion SAFU (Secure Asset Fund for Users) emergency reserve to buy bitcoin ($BTC) over a 30-day period.
It has not helped much. The giant $BTC buy failed to win back its fans-turned-critics, with negative topics about Binance still trending on social media on a nearly daily basis.
As pressure continues to build over the exchange’s role in the historic liquidation event, founder Changpeng Zhao has blamed fake social media and unrelated bitcoin traders for bearishness.
He also attempted to divert blame from Binance onto Donald Trump for the crash, saying, “It’s pretty clear that the tariff announcements preceded the crash, not Binance system issues or Binance doing anything.”
